Basic cationic hair dyes have been available for use in cosmetic products for more than twenty years. They have been adapted for use in color refreshing shampoo and conditioners, temporary hair color gels, and cremes. The products are intended to enhance and refresh previously colored hair, neutralize an unwanted shade, bring new highlights, and create visible color change.
One of the main drawbacks for cationic dyes in many types of hair care products is they are not useful in combination with or within products containing anionic ingredients, particularly anionic surfactants. The combination of cationic dyes and anionic ingredient(s) in a single product, e.g., a color depositing shampoo, causes a reduction of foaming properties (in a shampoo, foaming is recognized as being a desirable attribute. A shampoo that does not foam or does not foam adequately or with a suitable foam quality generally has perceived consumer negatives) and reduced color deposition. The combination of the two could also cause precipitation of an unwanted anionic/cationic complex. Common industry practice therefore utilizes high levels/quantities of cationic dyes in order to compensate for these drawbacks while still achieving a desired level of color deposition. Consequently, existing color depositing shampoos must use greater amounts of dye in the products to account for the “waste” causing higher costs of goods and thus higher retail prices effectively rendering combined cationic dye with anionic surfactant products highly difficult to market.
The current industry alternative for color depositing shampoos is a combination of a cationic dye with amphoteric and/or nonionic surfactants. Those products do not suffer from the above stated disadvantages arising primarily from the opposing ionic charges of the dye and surfactant. Here again, however, there are well known disadvantages. One problem with coloring shampoos which are generally free of anionic surfactants (that is, they are based on nonionic, amphoteric and/or cationic surfactants) is that they have a tendency not to foam adequately or may have poor sensory properties associated with the foaming, such as a tendency for any foam that does generate to generate slowly, spread slowly, or to dissipate quickly. The viscosity of the product(s) is also difficult to control. Addition of a small amount of an anionic surfactant (which adds to the production steps and increases cost of goods) is sometimes done to improve the foaming properties of a dye product made with a nonionic, amphoteric and/or cationic surfactants, knowing the resulting product will suffer from decreased dye deposition and/or suffer long term stability issues such as tonal shifts, precipitation or separation.
Thus there is a need for a color depositing shampoo made with cationic dyes that is substantially free from anionic surfactants with good foaming properties to efficiently and effectively deliver the dyes to the hair. It would be highly beneficial to have a color depositing shampoo that can achieve equal, if not more, dye deposition (and thus color change) compared to existing products, using less dye within the compositions of those existing products. There is a need for a color depositing shampoo that has less waste of dye when used. There is a need for a lower cost to manufacture color depositing shampoo that can effectively deposit color with good foaming properties.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide a shampoo based formulation that will efficiently color the hair and effectively clean the hair. It is also an object of the invention to provide a shampoo based formulation that will replace ordinary shampoo but also be useful as a hair dye, a composition with improved and more desirable foaming properties.